What to Do When the Mice Eat the Money, or, ‘Where Are the Non-subsidized Financial Services for Persons with Disabilities?’

> Posted by Mary Dakim, Intern, Financial Inclusion for Persons with Disabilities Program

Mary Dakim

Portfolios of the Excluded: Anyone who has lived or worked in the field recognizes the difference in international development research that is enriched by voices and realities of the field versus what is produced in developed countries based on books, internet searches, and a general literature review. For that reason, I was delighted to hear of The Center for Financial Inclusion’s goal of finding case studies from across the world of non-subsidized financial services for persons with disabilities (PWDs). I think their approach will yield a more authentic perspective on the magnitude of exclusion for this population. Whether the investigation yields root causes on the demand or supply side, it will allow for a deeper understanding of the opportunities and obstacles persons with disabilities as well as financial service providers face in reaching inclusion for this population. If you have case studies, please let us know via a comment below or email us.

In hopes of providing one of those “voices from the field,” I offer you my own story. My personal experience living in Nigeria for 28 years as a woman with a disability and facing poverty is unlike the millions of other similar women with disabilities whose stories will remain unwritten and unknown. I was lucky to have been accompanied on my personal path to financial citizenship.

Access to Finance: I was born and raised in poverty. My parents, who are both farmers, did not have access to microfinance. They were income-generating farmers who, like many of their peers, hid their money in a metal box.

My old elementary school in Nigeria.

To access “credit,” my father would borrow money from friends and repay his loan with maize harvest. Personally, while growing up in the village, I would hide my money under my bed. However, I would switch locations from time to time for fear that someone would find it. One time, during elementary school, I decided on a large cardboard box that was attached to a wall of my grandmother’s room. Formerly, the large box was home to my brother’s three birds; now, it was my personal safe deposit box. Despite my sense of security, one day, mice destroyed the money (US$30), which was in the form of paper notes. It had taken me 3 months of selling cooked vegetables after school to save that amount, and I had hoped to spend it on a school lunch allowance that my parents could not afford. I could have purchased at least 2 weeks’ worth of lunches. Similar situations were true for most of my friends who were deaf—they hid any cash they had under their pillows or elsewhere in their homes.

First Bank Visit in Nigeria: My first formal banking experience was in 2001 (at about 27 years old) when I began teaching at a public school for the deaf. A leader in the deaf education community in Nigeria accompanied me to a bank, where he had an account. The treatment that I received and the overall experience were both helped enormously by his presence and status as an existing customer. For example, before the agent realized that my friend was an existing customer, the agent was unwilling to communicate with us in writing—we were limited to reading his lips. In fact, the agent initially thought that we were beggars, since some people who are deaf in Nigeria enter offices, banks, and public places with requests for charity. Eventually, this bank closed, and I was unable to salvage my assets, since I was already in the United States.

First Bank Visit in the United States: My first banking visit in the United States could not have been more different. Again, I was lucky to be accompanied, this time by an employee of Gallaudet University, who is assigned to support the on-boarding of international students to their new communities. As soon as we informed the bank employee we were deaf, she reached for paper and pen and even attempted to communicate with the sign language that she knew. I was treated like any other new customer who spoke a different language. I appreciated the effort made by the staff at the Northeast branch (722 H Street) of Bank of America in Washington, DC. I experienced financial inclusion.

Remembering Quality: While the adoption, signing, and ratifying of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has the capacity to increase the integration of PWDs into formal financial services, it is not enough. Even if an MFI aims to work towards financial inclusion, how will quality be ensured and measured as a part of this quest for inclusion? What happens when the person with disability is unaccompanied — whether in Nigeria or the United States?

I was delighted to read Beth Rhyne’s announcement that the Center for Financial Inclusion seeks to answer this question about quality, among others, as a part of their leadership in financial inclusion. I agree with her perspective that the purpose of microfinance “is not to cure poverty but to reach out to the most marginalized groups.” Not only does the Center’s Smart Campaign protect clients, but also new programs like the one aimed towards financial inclusion for persons with disabilities will afford opportunities to preserve the quality of products and services that all people deserve as they define the destinies of their own financial citizenship.

Founding Sponsor

Credit Suisse is a founding sponsor of the Center for Financial Inclusion. The Credit Suisse Group Foundation looks to its philanthropic partners to foster research, innovation and constructive dialogue in order to spread best practices and develop new solutions for financial inclusion.

Note

The views and opinions expressed on this blog, except where otherwise noted, are those of the authors and guest bloggers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Center for Financial Inclusion or its affiliates.

7 comments

Dear Ms. Dakim,
Thank you for giving us readers a glimpse into the financial life of a woman with a disability in rural Nigeria. I appreciate the distinction you made between your own story and the many other untold stories of women across the globe. It’s important to keep in mind the factors that prevent and/or support people from accessing financial inclusion in different parts of the world. It seems you were lucky to have been accompanied on your own journey.
Thank you again for sharing. Hope to read more from you soon.
Sincerely,
Leah

Thank you, Leah, for your review and comment. The program on Financial Inclusion for Persons with Disabilities hopes to illuminate the realities faced by the excluded. What are your thoughts on what factors might prevent and/or support financial inclusion for PWDs? Any untold stories of which you are aware? Please share!

Ms. Mary Dakim,
Wow, I really appreciate that you shared your story of your financial experience between your home country, Nigeria and United States. You gave me a better light of what those people with disabilities faced with financial hardship in different parts of other countries. Indeed, I agree with you whether the UNCRPD has the capability to improve financial inclusion for PWDs because there are many factors that prevent from PWDS to have the access to financial services in anywhere in the world. I am positive it will be a quite long progress to breakdown the barriers for PWDs.

Thank you for sharing both the obstacles and openings you faced in your efforts to gain financial inclusion. I appreciate the attention you draw to the gap between formal and actual “inclusion” of People With Disabilities into such things as financial services, pointing up the need for design and assessment protocols sensitive to such things as the qualitative dimension of participants’ interactions with banking (and other financial services) institutions. This is a keen insight into one of the ways that the UN-CRPD must be strengthened in implementation so that all people will have the opportunity to create sustainable livelihoods regardless of disability status (or perceived disability).

I am also particularly struck by the role of human relationships and interactions in your descriptions of financial advocacy. You demonstrate so poignantly the importance of every-day human connections in not only gaining access to financial services but in feeling a sense of ownership and belonging relative to that access. You show that that there is power in accompanying a friend to the bank. Thank you Ms. Dakim. I look forward to reading more of your work.

Thank you, Rachelle, for your review and comment on this post; The Center for Financial Inclusion aims to understand and address the challenges and opportunities of access to financial services by PWDs. If you have additional ideas regarding financial access for PWDs, please share.

This is such an inspirational comment, thank you for the review. I agree with you regarding the human relationship and interaction which should be viewed as an important step toward achieving both formal and actual inclusion of persons with disabilities (PWDs) in financial services. Again, you brought an important point on the need to strengthen the CRPD to ensure full inclusion of all categories of PWDs. If you have additional ideas regarding access to financial or general inclusion for PWDs, please share with us.